Lethal Ransom

by Laurie Alice Eakes

  So considerate, so thoughtful that she might need some time alone. And he hadn’t freaked when she cried. The benefits of a man with sisters.

  As if she needed to think about Nick Sandoval’s benefits. “I’m sorry I dragged you into this.”

  “I think I’m the one who dove into this.”

  She smiled at his joke, then sobered. “Seriously. I should have listened and not gone off on my own.”

  “It’s done, Kristen. You can’t undo the past. You can only move on with the future.” He laughed, though she didn’t know why, and squeezed her hand. “Try to sleep.”

  She didn’t think she could, but sheer fatigue overcame the discomfort of her battered feet and aching limbs, and she dozed off remembering how nice Nick’s arms felt wrapped around her.

  He’d only been comforting her. Nothing more. He was treating her like one of his sisters, probably an annoying one always causing him trouble. Still, she couldn’t deny his kindness.

  Or the fact that her feelings for him weren’t exactly sisterly.

  She smiled in her sleep and dreamed of a Fourth of July celebration with fireworks shooting brilliant stars and flowers and flags into the air.

  She awoke gasping for breath with the realization the fireworks of her dream were, in wakeful reality, gunshots.

  * * *

  Nick lay motionless beneath a fallen log, the best shelter he had found for himself not too far from Kristen, and listened to the crackle of distant gunfire. He thought it came from the lake but had no idea what anyone would be shooting at dawn. Maybe their pursuers thought they saw him and Kristen. Shadows played tricks on tired men with quick fingers on their triggers.

  The shooting could be as innocent as someone target practicing. At dawn that seemed unlikely, but people took odd notions of what they wanted.

  Whatever the source, he and Kristen needed to assume the worst and get moving. They had been in one place for too long. They needed to find shelter and a form of communication.

  Nick rolled from beneath the log and stood. He brushed down his clothes as best he could and headed down the narrow path to Kristen’s shelter. Each step hurt his essentially bare feet. Every rock in Wisconsin seemed to dig into his heels. At least Kristen had her sneakers. Her feet didn’t need any more assault than they had already suffered and he doubted he possessed the energy to carry her far without any form of nourishment for nearly sixteen hours.

  Not concerned anyone would hear him above the singing of the birds, he whistled as he approached Kristen so she wouldn’t be frightened. “It’s me,” he announced.

  She poked her head through a gap in the branches. “I feel like a porcupine.”

  The corners of Nick’s lips twitched.

  She rather resembled one with pine needles poking from her hair like quills.

  “Don’t laugh. I’m humiliated enough.” She brushed the tangled golden mass away from her face, her skin as white as fresh snow. “Was that gunfire?”

  “Yep.” He held out his hands. “Let me help you up.”

  “Is it those men after us?” Her eyes were huge and dark in the pale light.

  “I don’t know, but we need to get moving in case it is.”

  She took his hands and rose, her teeth sinking into her lower lip. He hoped she wasn’t about to cry again. He didn’t run from weeping females, not with two sisters, but neither did he like to see women upset enough to cry. He wanted to make the world all better for them, and right then, he couldn’t make much better for Kristen.

  He wouldn’t think about how nice holding her felt. Neither was it the time to think about how well her head nestled against his shoulder.

  “Let’s go, then.” She tugged on his hand and began to walk, back straight, ponytail fanning out in curls and tangles and a collection of pine needles like some elaborate hairdo for a costume.

  He wanted to find a hairbrush, remove the band holding her hair up, and brush it smooth for her, feel the silkiness of each long strand as it ran through his fingers.

  He needed to get them to a form of communication and safety before he lost all reason where she was concerned.

  “Which direction should we take?” Kristen asked at a Y in the path.

  Any direction away from the one I’m thinking with you.

  “Right,” he said aloud. “We want to skirt the lake but keep inland enough we can’t be seen.”

  Especially if those men were still waiting for them along the shoreline. Around the shoreline.

  He wondered if they should head in a different direction instead of seeking for occupied houses on the south side of the lake. The pursuers might be there already. They could tell anyone in the cottages a story about Kristen and Nick being fugitives from the law.

  But he had no idea in which direction they could go to find people. Far enough east, they would reach Lake Michigan, but how far? They could be dozens of miles from the coast.

  Nick walked along behind Kristen, ears open for sounds of people, either friend or foe. He couldn’t hear much above the birds and wind in the trees. The chilly wind smelled damp. By now, the sun should have brightened the sky beyond the branches. It hadn’t. The sky remained gray, sultry. Rain was coming. They needed to find shelter quickly or they would be soaked a second time. A third time for Nick. His clothes still felt clammy from the swim. Baggy in the knees and itchy. Kristen must feel as bad or worse. Her feet certainly must be hurting her. Rocks protruded between the layers of moldering leaves and pine needles. Stepping on those rocks hurt.

  He glanced down to watch for stones and noticed one was smeared with red, with blood. Fresh blood.

  Through her shoes.

  He looked and saw she no longer wore her sneakers.

  “Kristen?” He put out a hand and grasped her shoulder, halting her.

  She glanced back, eyes huge and rimmed with dark circles of fatigue. “Yes?”

  “You lost your shoes.”

  “I couldn’t keep swimming in them, so I kicked them off.”

  “And now your feet are bleeding. Don’t they hurt?”

  She nodded.

  “Why didn’t you say something?” Nick began to think of how he could bandage her feet.

  She shrugged. “What good would it do? It’s not like we’d stop and change direction for an urgent care center.”

  “No, but I could bandage them.”

  “With what?”

  He looked at himself. His clothes were filthy. Wrapping wounds in anything he might manage to tear from his shirt or pants could do more harm than leaving the wounds open to the air.

  He sighed. “Good point.” He touched her cheek. It was smooth and cool like some kind of special cloth; the smooth stuff Gina’s wedding dress had been made of. Not silk. Too flimsy. Satin. That was it—delicate but strong. “I’m sorry you have to go through this.”

  “Why are you apologizing? I did this.” She turned her back on him and resumed walking.

  He followed, not knowing what to say. She was right. She had gone off on her own and gotten captured by those men, but he had followed her into the river instead of calling for assistance.

  “I didn’t have to jump in the river after you. I could have called for help,” he said at last.

  “And who knows what would have happened to me.”

  Only God knew what would happen to them now.

  “We need to find a stream or river,” Nick changed the subject with noticeable abruptness. “Running water will cleanse your feet.”

  “How do we do that?”

  “We listen.”

  Running water was going to be coming from the sky if the glowering clouds were any indication. They could be in outright danger if lightning accompanied the rain.

  All they could do was keep moving. Moving forward. Seeking shelter.

  They walked in silence
for a quarter hour, listening to the gurgle of flowing water. Then Kristen paused and glanced back to him.

  “Should you have called for help instead of jumping in the river after me?”

  “I did.” He may as well be honest.

  “Are you in trouble?”

  “I was ordered to stick close to you and bring you into protective custody as soon as possible.”

  “My nanny.” She sighed and trudged on.

  He followed, trying to concentrate on picking up signals from their surroundings rather than thinking about what Callahan would say to him. Nick was supposed to bring Kristen in, not follow her through the Wisconsin woods. Callahan wouldn’t care how difficult keeping her to safety was. The US marshal would have nothing nice to say. And if the judge hadn’t been released, probably lots of harsh words instead. Getting Kristen back safe and sound would help.

  He hoped. He prayed. He liked his job.

  Sir, he imagined his argument, I couldn’t let those men take her in front of me when I had a chance to stop them. I know I didn’t stop them, but here she is safe and sound.

  He glanced at her limping stride and added, Mostly sound.

  So far, they had avoided getting riddled with bullets.

  But they couldn’t avoid the rain. It began as a smattering of drops seeping through the canopy of leaves overhead and progressed to a deluge pouring upon them like someone had turned on a thousand garden hoses.

  They took shelter under the heaviest roof of leafy branches they found, Nick’s arm around Kristen for some semblance of warmth. Kristen hugged her arms across her chest and shivered, teeth chattering.

  “Is thi-this J-June or M-March?” she asked.

  “March.” Nick smiled.

  Then, as abruptly as it began, the rain ceased, and the sun blazed down like August.

  “Let’s find a clearing where we can warm in the sun.” Nick took Kristen’s hand, still cold, and headed toward a sound he thought might be the splash of water.

  It was. They broke through the trees to find a stream no more than six feet wide, but deep after the deluge.

  “Sit on the bank and put your feet in the water,” Nick directed her.

  She dropped to the muddy edge, slid her feet in and gasped. “That’s cold.”

  Nick sat beside her and dropped his own feet into the water. She was right. The water felt like snow runoff. But the sun warmed them. It warmed the flies and mosquitos too. They swarmed Nick and Kristen like they were a banquet ready to be consumed.

  Kristen swatted them away. “This is why my mom never wanted an outdoor kind of vacation. She hates insects. If the tiniest fly gets into the house, she doesn’t rest until it’s squashed.”

  “We could do with some bug spray.”

  They fell silent. Nick knew what he needed to ask Kristen, something that would appease Callahan and help solve the case. But she looked so tired and defeated he didn’t wish to disturb her.

  He gave her time to rest and think, while he pulled off the shreds of his socks and examined his own feet. They were bruised and scratched but hadn’t sustained any serious damage. He would walk on what was left of his socks, the uppers, until he could obtain some shoes or flip-flops at the least.

  He looked at Kristen’s feet in the water. The remnants of her bandages still encircled her ankles. If he removed those strips of gauze, he could wrap them on her feet to protect the cuts.

  “May I move those bandages to your feet?” he asked.

  She glanced down. “I forgot they were even there they’ve been on so long.” She moved back so her feet no longer dangled in the water, and pulled the wet gauze away from her skin. “These are kind of pathetic, but they will be better than nothing.” She handed him the gauze strips.

  They were sodden and gray, but better than walking on bare, cut soles.

  He sat cross-legged on the bank and lifted one of her feet onto his knee. A long scratch ran from her arch to her heel. He traced it with his fingertip, seeking the heat signaling infection brewing beneath the surface.

  She jumped and giggled. “Sorry. That tickles.”

  “I’ll try not to touch you again.”

  The soles of her feet anyway. He wanted to touch her hand, her face, her lips.

  Where had that idea come from? The last thing he needed to be doing was thinking of kissing Kristen Lang. It passed well beyond the bounds of propriety, of professional behavior. He wouldn’t think of such a thing again.

  “So who is Raven Kirkpatrick?” he asked to set his mind firmly on important matters and not dangerous fantasies. “Besides the daughter of a dangerous man.”

  “The daughter of a dangerous man.” Kristen ripped up several blades of grass. “If I say more, I’m breaking a confidence.”

  “And client confidentiality?”

  Kristen drew in a breath. “She’s not a client anymore, so anything since isn’t technically confidential.”

  Nick wound gauze around her foot. “How will kidnapping you help this man?” Nick asked.

  “He probably wants to stop her from testifying against him.”

  “Do you know where she is?” He tied the ends around her big toe as though she were wearing thongs.

  “I do. I also know her new name since I helped her get it.”

  “Is she in the witness protection program?”

  Kristen shook her head. “She didn’t qualify. But she’s nineteen and free to go where she likes.”

  “But you gave her a new life anyway. And if those men catch you, they can force you, in probably unpleasant ways, to divulge this information.”

  “Yes.”

  “Why do they want it?”

  “That’s getting into the confidentiality realm.”

  “But I can presume that having her father find her wouldn’t be a good idea.”

  “I can’t tell you what conclusions to draw.”

  “Good enough.” Nick tied off the second bandage. “This should help.”

  “Thank you.” She drew her legs back and started to rise.

  “Careful. The bank’s soft here.” Nick cupped his hands beneath her elbows and lifted her to the solid ground.

  And when they stood on the grass, with the sun pouring over them like lemon sauce and her eyes, bluer than the sky, gazing into his, he couldn’t bring himself to let her go. Too easily they could have died the night before. Too easily they could still die. But for that moment, they were alive and warm in the sweet-smelling, peaceful woods, and he wanted to celebrate that gift that might be all to fleeting.

  “Will you think I’m awful if I tell you I want to kiss you?” he found himself asking.

  Her eyes widened. Her lips parted. And she merely shook her head, her porcupine hairdo glinting in the sun.

  He took the head shake and the parted lips as a no, she didn’t object, and cupped her face in his hands. For a moment, their eyes met, and then her lids dropped and Nick touched his lips to hers.

  TEN

  Nothing felt so wonderful as Nick’s fingertips on her face and his lips on hers. Kristen hadn’t realized how much she wanted him to kiss her until he asked.

  She had been stunned speechless by his question. She was left light-headed from his kiss.

  And a voice shouted in her head, No, no, no. He’s law enforcement. He isn’t right for you.

  He would miss dinners and birthdays and anniversary celebrations. He could get shot and leave her heartbroken and alone. She had no business kissing him.

  She flattened her hands against his chest and pushed him away. “I’m sorry. I can’t. I shouldn’t have. We need to get out of here now.”

  She heard the frantic edge in her voice and felt her heart rate kick up a notch, then two. Her breath caught in her throat, keeping her from inhaling further. She opened and closed her mouth, gasping for air.


  “Kristen, you’re all right. Breathe. Breathe.” Nick sounded like he was on the other side of a brick wall. “I’ve got you. Just breathe.”

  His hands gripped hers, an anchor in the storm of her panic, her need to run from what she couldn’t face—her attraction to a most unsuitable man.

  She breathed, drawing air in through her nose like she was going to sing. The oxygen reached the bottom of her lungs. For a moment, she was dizzy with the influx of air, and then the world returned to focus and her heart rate began to slow.

  “I’m okay.” She managed a feeble smile.

  “Yes, you are definitely okay.” Nick’s smile was not feeble.

  Oh, she liked him—too much for her own good. She liked him enough to make her panic at the idea of liking him.

  “Ready to walk?” Nick asked.

  Kristen slapped at a mosquito. “We’d better, though if we stay, the mosquitos just might carry us off and save our feet.”

  “I like how you can keep your humor in this situation. It shows strength.”

  “Strength? Me? I keep freaking out and you tell me I have strength.”

  “You have tremendous courage, and that takes strength.” Nick offered her his arm. “Shall we?”

  They walked like that, her hand resting in the crook of his elbow, for as long as the stream bank allowed. Then they walked single file, following the flow of the water. The day grew hot. Kristen’s stomach hurt with hunger. After considering the risks of catching something nasty like giardia, they cupped their hands and drank from the stream. Kristen’s feet cried out for a soft ottoman to prop them on. Her leg muscles yearned for a hot, soothing bath. Her head longed for a fluffy pillow.

  By the time they began to see signs of civilization, she could barely set one foot in front of the other.

  They smelled smoke first, barbecue smoke. Someone was cooking chicken over a grill. Kristen stopped, inhaled and nearly fainted with the wonder of the aroma. Her mouth watered and she moaned aloud.

  “It does smell great, doesn’t it?” Nick grinned at her. “Where there’s barbecue smoke, there’s people.”

  They followed their noses, turning the wrong way once and losing the scent, then picking it up again until Kristen caught the bang of a screen door and peal of laughter.